turn a different angle of this story. here to. the spanish find out more visit actuality. today's news on the week's top stories in belfast fury have a clashes in northern ireland leave at least twenty nine hundred i mean anger over the city council's decision to remove the british flag for most of the year. bottom of mali paris held the government drive out al qaeda linked to rebels from the key town with west africa also pledging reinforcement. on the brother of the news the un president any good china denies roots believed days in a coma and made mounting concerns how the government will fare without its charismatic leader.

the latest news and the week's top stories this is the way cleone are see with me thanks for joining us these spiraling protests over the flying of the union chalk in northern ireland once again ended in a street battle between loyalists and nationalists on friday twenty nine police officers were injured struggling to keep the two sides apart it's been almost six weeks since belfast city council voted to reduce the number of days the british flag is displayed sparking the fury of the loyalist aussies a staff reports now from belfast. clashes breaking out once again on the streets of belfast you can see the police say just trying to push back the crowds a. huge number of police rather sadly fights like this becoming all too common now

this isn't going to have been helped by the fact that many feel inflammatory political language has helped to whip up the tensions here on the street. recreational rioting that well some people are calling it. you can see the fates had. just. brought the police responding with the worst the concert in the sun protests have been about the flag but the scale and intensity of that has been the. much much more than just that he students the director of the east belfast mission creep is working with young protesters to try to calm the tensions some kids are doing it for fun or doing it for more sinister motives in terms of control terms of par in terms of ego some are doing it because it's sexier than the playstation you know young girls are doing it because girls even with young children we've seen on the streets who are goofing of fully realized what their

actions to result. in some ways to having a laugh and yet there's nothing funny about it one of the protesters tell us in. just a one hour flight back of one hour and pays to get off their back ses peter robinson least you're not silly not them he was the one that had to start. the day forty and they fought for us to come out on the street to protest against. the nice said on his back save maybe take all the flak he's called was rubbish and. you know but when he wanted also to on the streets for his own actions we can make for do you think the protesters would accept any kind of compromise when it comes to this when the flag of. we know we're not going to get a back up to normal action because the majority really. uneasy new list for this now holds to try to reengage politically but we're told much more will

need to be done they'll be quick fixes here i don't think there's any silver bullet i think there's a different things need to happen economic. investment political investment community investment by and by all the stakeholders in these communities to try to resolve the wide draft of issues that are a blight here it's a fall there's been a one hundred people arrested more than sixty police officers injured and millions of pounds spent in policing these riots and in lost business revenue. these riots have been highly localized damage has already been far reaching. this is a new generation pulling back on to the streets of belfast it's a far cry from the darker days of northern ireland's complex that doesn't make it any less troubling. surfer.

earlier this week we discussed the problems with a make a film on the list and founding editor one of northern ireland political blogs o'toole and his thing is the prose has come from a lack of a consistent opposition in the local parliament. what we're seeing here is in northern ireland as a result of the peace process we have a government in which everyone who's elected to the parliament is part of the government that leaves no speeches for parliamentary opposition and so when something like this happens that is seen by a certain mostly working class certainly in middle class communities to be provocative there is no political way of actually expressing your opposition so just some extent we're seeing just how are you difficult it is to manage. a popular protest in a situation where there is no option to change the government so to speak because

the government includes everyone who ever gets elected frons has stepped up security in the country and made fears of islamist tongues due to its ongoing operation and not only it comes after power is helps the government drive out al qaeda linked militants from the cape town of qana a french helicopter pilot was killed along with more than one hundred militants and at least ten civilians including three children and west african forces are now set to join the efforts with its troops due to arrive in the country by monday the u.k. also agreed to help transport foreign troops without sending any soldiers of their own the african contingent is expected to draw around five hundred soldiers. final so cynical and while the french president francois hollande said on saturday that military support will go on for as long as necessary france based independent journalist are all but harness believes french foreign policy is contradictory to be made yet. first and again i think that as long as the french people are to gaza

by the consequences of this sort of intervention they generally favorite this as a great military tradition in france and they've grown accustomed to interfering other people's countries but if you if the minute it starts to get nasty i think you'll find they'll be a very quick a reversal of public opinion these sort of islamic extremists they're very tough soldiers and they've grown tougher over the last twenty years and if france starts to find these people who have been armed as a result of the intervention in libya and all the arms of the swilling about in the in the sahara as a result of that intervention ironically instigated by france then they're going to find it's a very dangerous place to intervene that mali has requested help and they get it instantly when the central african republic requested help from the french forces there they we're told are now we got into the air to tell any particular regime

were neutral. it to do if if you had wanted to destroy the credibility of france and the western countries over the last five or ten years you couldn't have done a better job by the absurd contradictions in what they do. for insurers have not enjoyed the same success in somalia with special forces failed in their mission to rescue a hostage in the south of the country the botched operation led the captives secret agent dead along with two french soldiers and seventeen militants from al qaeda as al shabaab cell currently eight other french nationals are thought to be held hostage across africa. the brown the ailing president hugo chavez has denied rumors the venezuelan leader is in a coma this after thousands of his supporters rallied on the day when he should have been sworn in for another term the venezuelan supreme court has postponed. indefinitely while charges recovers from cancer surgery in cuba drew political

analyst eric draitser fears forces from abroad could trying to take advantage of china says absence. so the opposition despite all of their posturing and despite the fact that the private corporate media inside of venezuela and around the world is very much squarely behind them and us imperialism they lack a very real base of support on the ground they have some support but as we saw in the results of the recent elections that opposition is still very much in the minority now in terms of an international destabilization using this opposition this is very much a very real possibility of course we've seen much of the destabilization campaign emanating out of the u.s. embassy out of the institutions that's why we saw u.s. a id and other international organizations that are controlled by the state department booted out of that country or at the very least minimized so this is a standard tactic that is very much part of the playbook of twenty first century

imperialism of the united states but again the danger here is that without chavez and without the power of his personality that they'll be able to attack those institutions inside the country the question will be how strong are the ball of aryan institutions and how willing is that base of support to come out into the streets in support of the revolution and against what could only be called counter-revolutionaries of the opposition representing wall street in washington. meanwhile venezuela has been a crazy increasingly attracting those seeking a better living with more and more immigrants flocking to the country and this account and exonerates of why people are trading life in countries such as the u.s. but the south american nation put no end in sight to the financial crisis many are finding refuge in countries with an alternative economic model or some business well that represents hope and new opportunities to bolivarian republic may be a surprising choice after all it's been ranked as one of the most corrupt nations

in the hemisphere whose murder rate exceeds that of iraq still the world bank says venezuela draws the largest number of immigrants after argentina with one million fly. in here in two thousand and ten alone the muscles. get weaker rosa is one of them after decades of struggling in the u.s. she decided to start anew in venezuela by the end that come to you completely alone you go that trying to find a new way but you really alone nobody helps you there nobody in caracas the helping hand came from the government a cheap loan to kickstart a small business and subsidies that enabled her to purchase this home that's why rosa and others like her see the country as a place where. you can move more freely here you have more opportunities. robust economic growth and increased spending on social projects to help create those opportunities having the state on your side in terms of the benefits is a huge thing because you don't have to worry about your basic necessities everyone

has the right to universal free health care quality health care education at all levels the government provide subsidies to start up small businesses medium sized businesses that do the same in terms of housing to help people if they're coming from a country where the economic crisis is so bad they've been cutting all those benefits but as well it begins to look like a paradise that may certainly seem to be the case for those on the bottom president hugo chavez helped bring the poverty rate down from fifty percent when he took office to roughly thirty one percent and the u.n. says venezuela has the lowest level of inequality in latin america. it's one child has diehard supporters among the poor but what about the rich critics say chavez is illya meeting the wealthy many of whom turned out in droves to vote for his opponent in october closely contended election twenty first century socialism hasn't helped us it has hurt a child his opponents blame his so-called socialist experiment for problems like

limited foreign investment they say that it's driving businessmen and entrepreneurs out of the country. by daniel year g.'s himself a young businessman disagrees after spending twelve years in barcelona he decided to return to venezuela not just for the economic benefits he says but for the chance to partake in a different sort of future order there are two very different political forces in this country one wants to move towards capitalism the other is on the path of socialism in the october election the people of venezuela voted to make the country greener fairer to create more opportunities and in this regard many venezuelans like myself have decided to return home and so they do showing that for some gambling in venezuela system may be worth the risk. of r.t. venezuela. caged without trial eleven years on the infamous gone time in the prison remains open for business that's despite human rights groups calling for the

facility to be shutdown we'll bring you more on the public. along with insight from former detainees and later. on closing up as rival palestinian groups hamas and fatah try to breach that divisions look into how israel's occupation forces lay out all the functions closer together all the. deadly rivals the decades. if you had fifteen thousand people killing each other in any other country there would be diplomats there would be mediators. self-imposed out costs from society i will tell myself am i going to tell my brother understand michael on my own immediate i'm going to leave basically attend

the call of my anger and my frustration the anger that they got great well into the church and those. two of the most violent gangs in u.s. history. is just all modeled kill or be killed with colors matching the national flag. of this country uses violence whenever chooses and then it legitimizes the violence they are made in america on the oxy. choose your language. a good week over the winter for the medical field.

treatments that you can see if you. choose. the great. choose the stories but if you. choose the accent after. you're watching art see president obama said u.s. forces will end most combat operation in afghanistan by this spring and switch to manus support for as a meeting in washington between the president and i'm going to leader hamid karzai and was agrees that in this new capacity american forces could remain beyond the twenty fourteen pullout and phyllis bennis from the washington based institute for policy studies believes it's still a long way off before local forces take full control. we're talking about an

official acknowledgement by the two governments that now the afghan military is in control what that means is anybody's guess but what it does not mean is that the u.s. troops are going to be pulled out early there's a huge occupation force in the country that's not going to be brought out in twenty thirteen in the spring what we're talking about is a claim that as of that time the afghan people the afghan military the afghan government will officially be in charge they will be in charge of the military now the idea that the u.s. forces still there or the nato forces still there are going to take their orders from the afghan military i think is rather spurious that's certainly not going to happen i don't think the afghan government has the capacity to survive without massive u.s. support that means both economic support and crucially military support but his reliance on that support leads to one massive corruption which is widely hated throughout the country karzai has very little public support in the country and

militarily his his very large army isn't capable of standing up to the other militias it's one more militia the u.s. leaving will leave his government and his own position in a very in a very precarious moment and he may well not survive that politically the notorious u.s. detention facility had gone time obeying kiba marked its eleventh anniversary this week despite president obama's four year old promise to close the account human rights groups are calling for freedom for those cleared for release and for all say a trial fathers meanwhile as a recount reports polls show the majority of americans have moved on. president obama's call to look forward not backward has resulted in attempts to sweep the past under the rug including some of his own promises earlier i intend to close guantanamo and i will follow through on that colonel morris davis was a chief prosecutor at guantanamo under george w.

bush and he later became a vocal critic of the practices there and strongly supported president obama's pledge to shut down the prison he says the perception of guantanamo in the u.s. has come a long way since two thousand and eight when he was a burning and highly controversial issue with the nation demanding action he gets a free pass on i mean the public largely could care less the mainstream media now here in the us. you know is more interested in car dash and then they are and what happens at guantanamo. so who's going to challenge it if we're looking for the biggest threat to america right now she's right there her name is kim carr does she in. america has moved on and so has its perception of torture polls by the american red cross show the majority of americans now find torture acceptable sixty percent of young people agree whereas four years ago torture was largely condemned in the us. hollywood has arguably contributed to that evolution of public opinion in the

movie zero dark thirty day or trade the information that led to the capture and killing of osama bin laden was obtained through enhanced interrogation techniques or torture and in fact that is simply not true actual information was obtained through a report based interrogation techniques the government classified everything related to its torture practices which allows politicians pundits and filmmakers the freedom to perpetuate all kinds of myths although a slew of washington insiders including the senate intelligence committee point out how torture has proved to be in a fair. but in america it's often fiction not facts that make history this is more important than reality this is the movies where americans learn their history and today the history in the making is the drone strikes this amounts to the administration executing people without due process often in absolute secrecy in

foreign lands with a remote control but it will obama's drones generate as much of a backlash as one tunnel did for george w. bush that we've now got have a generation that only knows the post nine eleven era. where things like guantanamo and the. warrantless wiretapping that's all they've ever known you know for a decade now and i think it's just become an accepted part of life unfortunately judging by how the guantanamo controversy evolved here is what may transpire with regards to drones the urgency of the issue will subside in the u.s. because there will be no american troops dying there will be no strong public movement to oppose the program there may even be a movie or two out even if the logical capabilities of drones and once the controversy dies down it will become the new normal and america will move on

in washington i'm going to check out. and fill from the human rights group cage presidents which fights to help the politico detainees worldwide believes those how didn't go on tom i'm opposed to no terrorist threat and we're full of intelligence gathering. it doesn't seem that guantanamo is going to close any time soon the u.s. of invested billions in the facility. seems that it's meant to last for very long time one hundred sixty six detainees are remaining in guantanamo most of them have been cleared for release the detainees in guantanamo north right. to the world indeed they are victims they were not the worst of the worst they're people that were picked up in different countries or bought from. villages and brought to guantanamo they were never accused of any crime simply because the aim of guantanamo was not for them to face prosecution it was simply for them to be used

for intelligence purposes. and my colleague have a now and spoke with morocco now as he was held in guantanamo on what turned out to be groundless accusations and he was released after the u.s. military failed to get him to confess to crimes he never committed if you are not a terrorist they will live to try to make you. i should example i must say if i should agree that i am be a member of. that i did fight with probably want to go against american soldiers between the war. i should i should sign papers that i am be a member of but where the charges first. there was no reason for just the. pakistani people who saw through some dollar to the americans. that this man he was . very soon few months later they found out that i'm innocent they want me. that i'm going to sign papers forced me to sign papers that i should agree that i'm be

a member of the because because they didn't have anything against me in the same force as you have for shoes what were they doing to shoot to do that. they used torture techniques like waterboarding and electroshocks they sought after this i'm going to sign and agree that i'm being a member of al qaeda and every time i refused to sign they tried another kind of torture they saw i walked one time can you tell us the worst thing one of the better word that you saw going on there. i saw. i had used to be just nine or refuse or child's and. i think it was the worst i saw over there. there was not treating him better than us i didn't saw that they getting tortured but. to see children in the same camp it was bad

enough for me and also i saw people they got killed on the torture the bigger portion of the. kill so. i mean i have seen many things during this five years many thinks this is just a couple of those how do you feel after what you've been through in guantanamo through no fault of your own how does it make you feel as a human being. of course nobody can be happy after after all this happened but. i myself i'm trying to support human rights organizations to fight against torture around the world not just going to normal. around the world it's just more than more than twenty one secret prisons where people are getting tortured and guantanamo is just one of course. the leaders of rival political groups fatah and hamas have decided to implement

a unity agreement signed two years ago the pair met in cairo on wednesday amid israeli claims the talks were actually undermining the peace process they say as the easing of tension between the two while functions has already helped reunite one family in gaza previously torn apart by political strife and us policy of reports now israeli policies may have prompted both sides to discuss their differences. you know it's been five long years since this family was together one thousand eight hundred days since i'm in a muslim last saw her son his crime belonging to a group the gaza government was opposed to except this time it wasn't the israelis who forced him into exile but hamas and other brands are at the other with my family and house in gaza and headed for the west bank but it was only after the negotiations began that seventeen of us were given approval to go back home if it was back in two thousand and seven in a surprise coup that he must took control of gaza from wyvil faction group fatah

one hundred sixty one people were killed and more than seven hundred injured when the dust settled the palestinian people were divided a mass was in charge in gaza fatah called the shots in the west bank hundreds fled their homes from both in fear of their lives like other fatah supporters from gaza mohammed took with huge in the west bank waiting for the day we conciliation would come. all denied i prayed to god to protect my son muhammad i prayed for his safety and asked god to bring him back home safe and now for the first time reconsideration between the two sides looks promising each feels boosted by recent successes and is more willing to compromise her muscles capitalizing on the recent conflict with israel despite the heavy cost for fatah who's claiming victory after the president mahmoud abbas successfully upgrade a palestinian state has at the united nations as her mustn't factor move closer together the irony is that they're getting help from israeli prime minister

benjamin netanyahu in his right wing policies and rhetoric are winning the palestinian support and sympathy on the international stage it was on that one young who's watching that as the recent united nations palestinian statehood bid demonstrated european and failing support for israel has floundered it was also an attorney whose watch that u.s. is revelations reached their lowest ebb and now it's on his watch again that palestinian unity seems plausible. for her it's a long term interest of her for us to i think cooperate again because otherwise they're running the risk that the worst will be and probably perk of the same political structure which de facto right now is the case leaders from both sides have a new day course for the conciliation if you work with them you know you think that of course. between promotion for catastrophe it's proof for that doesn't mean peace etc etc but for this family nothing can detract from the feeling of

gratitude and joy of a father and son coming home the tears and smiles it could a hope that a new chapter is also about to open in gaza political life policy r.t. on the israel gaza border madrid has seen the first a spanish protest of twenty thirteen i made a burgeoning economic crisis in the year as thousands of doctors have marched through the country's capital angered by the government's plans to privatizing national health service and that was the united nations latest attempts to cut the budget and bring the country out of bed and investment advisor patrick yang says pain's economy has been spiraling out of control there's really absolutely nothing that can be done about the current spanish situation the government is affectively running a deficit around by nine percent of g.d.p. year that's a huge number being has the ten biggest deficit on the planet of any.